Left: The Royal Crescent, Bath. Middle: Prior Park. Right: The Circus, Bath [Click upon pictures for larger images.]

Compare these examples of eighteenth-century architecture with the couplets of Pope and the prose style of Swift and Johnson. In what senses does the neoclassical couplet match the symmetry, order and clarity of this kind of building style? Further, is there any way that you can relate the subject (and audience) of neoclassical literature to the inhabitants of these buildings?

Left: Prior Park Landscape Garden (outside Bath) . Right: The Circus, Bath designed by John Wood and Son. 1754. [Click on images to enlarge them.]

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Incorporated in the Victorian Web July 2000

Last modified 18 June 2018